Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope. says "As a 750,000-member grassroots organization with activists in all 50 states, we are uniquely well-positioned to take an environmental voter education campaign to the streets."

Sierra Club National "527" Voter Education Program in Full Swing: Battleground State Effort Targets Environmental Voters

WASHINGTON - September 14 - The Sierra Club announced today that it has launched the most ambitious voter education program in the 112-year-old environmental organization's history, and is on track to have direct conversations with nearly half a million voters in key states by November 2.

"Between now and Election Day, the Sierra Club will be contacting an average of 40,000 environmental voters in each of our sites at least eight times to educate them about the environmental records of George Bush and John Kerry," National Political Director Greg Haegele said.

"They'll hear from the Sierra Club at their doors, through the mail and on the phone at least eight times. It's an ambitious program, but we know these are people who care about the environment and we're committed to making sure they vote on November 2."

"The Sierra Club is targeting infrequent environmental voters - people who are known to care about the environment but don't always vote," Haegele said. "Our polling and research has found that there are hundreds of thousands of registered voters who rank the environment as one of the top issues affecting their ballot decisions, but for many reasons they don't always feel their votes will make a difference. We're letting them know their votes do count."

The Sierra Club's New Hampshire voter education program began during primary season in January and the other sites were added in August and September, culminating with the launch of the New Mexico program last week. Haegele said more than 300 staff members have been deployed and the Sierra Club expects to spend $8 million to $10 million by Election Day.

Sierra Club staff and volunteers have already knocked on more than 215,000 doors, begun making 400,000 phone calls, and launched an eight-week direct mail program. In addition, more than 2,200 people have volunteered to assist the Sierra Club's efforts. Haegele predicted the numbers will continue to rise each week, culminating in repeated direct conversations with more than 400,000 people before the election.

Begun in 1996, the Sierra Club's 527 voter education campaign previously focused on airing paid media in battleground states. However, the program was refocused on direct contact this year because research and experience indicated voters increasingly ignore and are not motivated to vote by television and radio advertising, Haegele explained.

"We've learned that voters like to get information from more personal conversations with friends and people in their communities," said Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope. "As a 750,000-member grassroots organization with activists in all 50 states, we are uniquely well-positioned to take an environmental voter education campaign to the streets."

Sierra Club members will launch a massive program dubbed "Road to Somewhere" this coming weekend, September 18-19, Pope said. "Volunteers from non-battleground states plan to travel to all of our targeted sites to help our staff with door-to-door canvassing and phone banks."

In conjunction with its Road to Somewhere events, the Sierra Club also will participate in America Votes "50 Million Women Count" rallies on Saturday, September 18. America Votes and its 33 member organizations, including Sierra Club, are conducting a nationwide get-out-the-vote effort targeting single women, the largest block of infrequent voters in general elections. Many of the environmental voters being targeted by the Sierra Club are single women.

For more information, visit http://www.SierraClubVotes.org

When this story was posted in October 2004, this was on the front page of PCOL:

Director Gaddi Vasquez: The PCOL InterviewPCOL sits down for an extended interview with Peace Corps Director Gaddi Vasquez. Read the entire interview from start to finish and we promise you will learn something about the Peace Corps you didn't know before.

Schwarzenegger praises PC at Convention Governor Schwarzenegger praised the Peace Corps at the Republican National Convention: "We're the America that sends out Peace Corps volunteers to teach village children." Schwarzenegger has previously acknowledged his debt to his father-in-law, Peace Corps Founding Director Sargent Shriver, for teaching him "the joy of public service" and Arnold is encouraging volunteerism by creating California Service Corps and tapping his wife, Maria Shriver, to lead it. Leave your comments and who can come up with the best Current Events Funny?

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Story Source: Common Dreams

This story has been posted in the following forums: : Headlines; COS - India; Election2004; Environment; Advocacy

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